Baptist News Global
Sections
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Opinion
  • Curated
  • Storytelling
    • Faith & Justice >
      • Charleston: Metanoia with Bill Stanfield
      • Charlotte: QC Family Tree with Greg and Helms Jarrell
      • Little Rock: Judge Wendell Griffen
      • North Carolina: Conetoe
    • Welcoming the Stranger >
      • Lost Boys of Sudan: St. John’s Baptist Charlotte
      • Awakening to Immigrant Justice: Myers Park Baptist Church
      • Hospitality on the corner: Gaston Christian Center
    • Signature Ministries >
      • Jake Hall: Gospel Gothic, Music and Radio
    • Singing Our Faith >
      • Hymns for a Lifetime: Ken Wilson and Knollwood Baptist Church
      • Norfolk Street Choir
    • Resilient Rural America >
      • Alabama: Perry County
      • Texas: Hidalgo County
      • Arkansas Delta
      • Southeast Kentucky
  • More
    • Contact
    • About
    • Donate
    • Planned Giving
    • Letters to the Editor
    • Advertising
    • Ministry Jobs and More
    • Transitions
    • Subscribe
    • Submissions and Permissions
Donate Subscribe
Search Search this site

Never again? Remembering Auschwitz amid enduring anti-Semitism and increasing acts of hatred

OpinionBill Leonard, Senior Columnist  |  January 29, 2020

In his memoir, Night, the late Romanian Jewish writer and Boston University professor Eli Wiesel recalled his 1944 arrival “at Birkenau, reception center for Auschwitz”:

“Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed. Never shall I forget that smoke. Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky. Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my faith forever. Never shall I forget the nocturnal silence which deprived me, for all eternity, of the desire to live. Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust. Never shall I forget these things, even if I am condemned to live as long as God himself. Never.”

Auschwitz didn’t just steal Eli Wiesel’s God, soul and dreams; it murdered them.

The 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by Russian soldiers occurred on Holocaust Remembrance Day, January 27, 2020. The day before, the Washington Post published reporter Gillian Brockell’s account of the exploits of Witold Pilecki, “a Polish resistance fighter who voluntarily went to Auschwitz to start a resistance.” His secret reports to Allies were the first to describe the cruelties of what became the largest of the Nazi death camps.

Brockell writes of Pilecki’s 1941 arrival at the camp:

“Nothing could have prepared him for the brutality he found. As he leaped out of a train car with hundreds of other men, he was beaten with clubs. Ten men were randomly pulled from the group and shot. Another man was asked his profession; when he said he was a doctor, he was beaten to death. Anyone who was educated or Jewish was beaten. Those remaining were robbed of their valuables, stripped, shaved, assigned a number and prison stripes, and then marched out to stand in the first of many roll calls.”

“Let none of you imagine that he will ever leave this place alive,” an SS guard declared. “The rations have been calculated so that you will only survive six weeks.”

The gas chambers were not operative at that time, but the ovens were already at work. Brockell notes, “The only way out of Auschwitz, another guard said, was through the chimney.” Over a year later, Pilecki miraculously escaped, continuing his anti-Nazi resistance in Poland only to be executed by the post-war Soviet-controlled Polish government in 1947.

Few prisoners escaped Auschwitz. Some 1.1 to 1.9 million human beings died there, 90 percent of whom were Jews. Others included some 19,000 Roma (“Gypsy”) people, disabled and LGBT persons, and resistance fighters. The last generation of Auschwitz survivors is passing off the scene, even as “Holocaust deniers” promulgate their lies, not only throughout Europe, but also in the land of the free and the home of “alternative facts.” The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum asserts that such denial is an anti-Semitic “claim that the Holocaust was invented or exaggerated by Jews as part of a plot to advance Jewish interests.” It is often closely linked to white supremacist and other racist theories (that are often accompanied by biblical citations and allusions).

These two irreconcilable statements must be heard as one: Auschwitz was liberated 75 years ago. Yet, anti-Semitism endures, now unleashed with new vigor in the American public square.

“The last generation of Auschwitz survivors is passing off the scene, even as ‘Holocaust deniers’ promulgate their lies.”

Jonathan Greenblatt, Anti-Defamation League CEO, observes that violent “acts of Anti-Semitism are now the new normal.” On the decline from 2001, they have risen sharply in the years since 2014. These include a shooting in December 2019 at a New Jersey Jewish market in which two people died; a deadly firearm attack on Chabad of Poway synagogue north of San Diego in April 2019; and the death of 11 Jewish worshipers at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh in October 2018.

The horrific words, “Jews will not replace us,” chanted in that white supremacist torchlight parade in Charlottesville, Virginia, on August 11, 2017, continue to haunt the American psyche. A day later, African American scholar Jemar Tisby asked in a Washington Post op-ed: “Will white pastors finally take racism seriously?” At the 75th anniversary of Auschwitz’s liberation, might we add: “Will Christians finally take anti-Semitism seriously?” Certainly, many have – but, God have mercy, not nearly enough.

How might we extend those efforts?

First, let us confess to, and repent of, the church’s historic legacy of anti-Semitism by which medieval Catholics compelled Jews to convert to Christianity, often scapegoating them as sources of assorted social upheavals, and ghettoing Jews across Europe. (There were minority voices, like the 12th-century Doctor of the Church, Bernard of Clairvaux, who attempted to offer support for the Jewish community. Bernard wrote, “For us the Jews are Scripture’s living words, because they remind us of what Our Lord suffered. They are not to be persecuted, killed, or even put to flight.”)

We Protestants have many anti-Semitic burdens to carry, beginning with Martin Luther’s 1541 diatribe, “On the Jews and their Lies,” which declared:

“What shall we Christians do with this rejected and condemned people the Jews? Since they live among us, we dare not tolerate their conduct, now that we are aware of their lying and reviling and blaspheming. If we do, we become sharers in their lies, cursing and blasphemy.”

Luther urged German Christians to “set fire to their synagogues or schools” and forbid their rabbis “to teach henceforth on pain of loss and limb.”

“Anti-Semitism endures, now unleashed with new vigor in the American public square.”

Closer to history and home, many Jews and Baptists of a certain age painfully recall Southern Baptist leader Bailey Smith’s 1980 assertion that “God Almighty does not hear the prayer of a Jew.” And I’ve never forgotten Professor Glenn Hinson’s prophetic rejoinder: “Such is the stuff of which Holocausts are made.”

Second, American Christians, particularly evangelicals, should resist the effort to think of Jews and their place in the world primarily as vehicles in events leading up to the premillennial return of Christ. That attitude can conceal an implicit anti-Semitism that understands Jews, not as people of God, but as pawns of premillennial theories.

Third, 21st-century Christians must ever struggle to distinguish anti-Semitism from political critiques of certain actions of the state of Israel in responding to Palestinians and others in the endless conflicts of what seems the irreconcilable “Holy Land.” This is a daunting task, to be sure. (BNG columnist Wendell Griffen boldly walked this fine line in a critique that merits rereading in light of the so-called “peace plan” announced January 28 by President Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu.)

Finally, the memory of Auschwitz provides a stark reminder to 21st-century America, challenging us to confront this critical moment in history. In A Spirituality of Resistance, Jewish philosopher/environmentalist Roger Gottlieb writes that “the Holocaust ‘prepares’ us” to confront the evils of our own time by remembering “how well-meaning, passive bystanders helped make the Holocaust possible.”

Gottlieb continues:

“The slaughter of six million Jews and five million other victims, carried out coldly and ‘rationally’ by civil servants and professionals as well as politicians and soldiers, by a ‘legitimate’ government and with the sanction or passive acceptance of much of the rest of the world, is an omen for the environmental ruin we are creating now.”

This week I came across this Holocaust Remembrance Day adage: “If we were to observe a moment of silence for all the victims of the Holocaust, we would have to remain silent for 11-and-a-half years.” And I remembered the words that bridge the Bible’s two Testaments: “A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud laments; Rachel weeping for her children, and refusing all consolation, because they were no more.”

Never again, Yahweh, never again.

Related Commentary:

How churches that don’t think they are anti-Semitic promote anti-Semitism | Brett Younger


OPINION: Views expressed in Baptist News Global columns and commentaries are solely those of the authors.
Tags:Bailey SmithHolocausthatredAnti SemitismAuschwitzwhite supremacyEli Wiesel
More by
Bill Leonard, Senior Columnist
  • Get BNG headlines in your inbox

  • Featured

    • The Black community needs allies who listen and act, scholar says

      News

    • When a Mexican cartel kidnapped a Baptist pastor, they got more than they bargained for

      News

    • Women of childbearing age are least likely to see strict abortion laws as best deterrent against abortion

      News

    • Progress on sexual abuse in the SBC? Not so fast

      Opinion


    Curated

    • Pope orders online release of WWII-era Pius XII Jewish files

      Pope orders online release of WWII-era Pius XII Jewish files

      June 24, 2022
    • Demolishing schools after a mass shooting reflects humans’ deep-rooted desire for purification rituals

      Demolishing schools after a mass shooting reflects humans’ deep-rooted desire for purification rituals

      June 24, 2022
    • Has American conservatism abandoned the Christian right?

      Has American conservatism abandoned the Christian right?

      June 24, 2022
    • In Colorado, a GOP rarity: An abortion rights candidate

      In Colorado, a GOP rarity: An abortion rights candidate

      June 24, 2022
    Read Next:

    Maybe seminaries should offer a class in mergers and acquisitions

    AnalysisMark Wingfield

    More Articles

    • All
    • News
    • Opinion
    • Curated
    • The French Dreyfus Affair and Trump’s Big Lie

      OpinionDavid Gushee, Senior Columnist

    • Women of childbearing age are least likely to see strict abortion laws as best deterrent against abortion

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Independence Day: Not to celebrate but to reflect

      OpinionKathy Manis Findley

    • U.S. State Department calls out Russia, China, Afghanistan, Myanmar for extreme religious freedom abuses

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Two viruses threaten the life of the Southern Baptist Convention: Male hierarchy and dominion theology

      AnalysisEllis Orozco

    • Progress on sexual abuse in the SBC? Not so fast

      OpinionDavid Clohessy and Christa Brown

    • Pranoto, Shaw, Smith and Younger join BNG board of directors

      NewsBNG staff

    • Uyghur American elected chairman of U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • When a Mexican cartel kidnapped a Baptist pastor, they got more than they bargained for

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • The Black community needs allies who listen and act, scholar says

      NewsPat Cole

    • Maybe seminaries should offer a class in mergers and acquisitions

      AnalysisMark Wingfield

    • Reflections on my mother’s funeral: The heart has reasons

      OpinionDavid Ramsey

    • Georgia Baptists hit snag on sale of 16-year-old headquarters property in suburban Atlanta

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • When ‘orthodoxy’ won’t hold: The SBC and the rest of us

      OpinionBill Leonard, Senior Columnist

    • At Faith and Freedom conference, evangelical Christian voters once again abandon their concern for marital fidelity

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Annual report on Baptist women in ministry finds some gains but serious losses due to COVID

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Seven suggestions for preventing conflict before it happens

      OpinionBill Wilson

    • Church-state separationists join Justice Sotomayor in blasting the Supreme Court’s ruling in a Maine school voucher case

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • The gospel according to mammals

      OpinionTyler Tankersley

    • Conservative clergywoman claims United Methodist system unjust

      NewsCynthia Astle

    • How God used Jay Bakker to teach me about race and loving all people

      OpinionMaina Mwaura

    • In Africa, inflation and a food crisis threaten not just the economy but people’s lives

      NewsAnthony Akaeze

    • When a teenager gets kicked to the curb by Christian parents

      OpinionDan McGee and Linda Francis Cross

    • American support for abortion rights at highest level since 1995, Gallup says

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Ministry jobs and more

      NewsBarbara Francis

    • Women of childbearing age are least likely to see strict abortion laws as best deterrent against abortion

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • U.S. State Department calls out Russia, China, Afghanistan, Myanmar for extreme religious freedom abuses

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Pranoto, Shaw, Smith and Younger join BNG board of directors

      NewsBNG staff

    • Uyghur American elected chairman of U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • When a Mexican cartel kidnapped a Baptist pastor, they got more than they bargained for

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • The Black community needs allies who listen and act, scholar says

      NewsPat Cole

    • Georgia Baptists hit snag on sale of 16-year-old headquarters property in suburban Atlanta

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • At Faith and Freedom conference, evangelical Christian voters once again abandon their concern for marital fidelity

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Annual report on Baptist women in ministry finds some gains but serious losses due to COVID

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Church-state separationists join Justice Sotomayor in blasting the Supreme Court’s ruling in a Maine school voucher case

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Conservative clergywoman claims United Methodist system unjust

      NewsCynthia Astle

    • In Africa, inflation and a food crisis threaten not just the economy but people’s lives

      NewsAnthony Akaeze

    • American support for abortion rights at highest level since 1995, Gallup says

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Ministry jobs and more

      NewsBarbara Francis

    • New platform of Texas GOP is laced with Christian privilege

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Author explores contradiction of evangelical support for prison ministry and tough-on-crime laws at same time

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • One year later, awareness of Juneteenth is growing

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Churches in Russian-occupied sections of Ukraine face desperate conditions

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Transitions for the week of 6-17-22

      NewsBarbara Francis

    • Many voices call for prosecution of mob who lynched and burned Christian student in Nigeria

      NewsAnthony Akaeze

    • Religious Liberty Council elects two BJC board members

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Still no external review of North American Mission Board finances

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Attempt to dismantle SBC Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission fails

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Brian Foreman named CBF’s coordinator of congregational ministries

      NewsBNG staff

    • Most Americans hang out with people who are a lot like them

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • The French Dreyfus Affair and Trump’s Big Lie

      OpinionDavid Gushee, Senior Columnist

    • Independence Day: Not to celebrate but to reflect

      OpinionKathy Manis Findley

    • Progress on sexual abuse in the SBC? Not so fast

      OpinionDavid Clohessy and Christa Brown

    • Reflections on my mother’s funeral: The heart has reasons

      OpinionDavid Ramsey

    • When ‘orthodoxy’ won’t hold: The SBC and the rest of us

      OpinionBill Leonard, Senior Columnist

    • Seven suggestions for preventing conflict before it happens

      OpinionBill Wilson

    • The gospel according to mammals

      OpinionTyler Tankersley

    • How God used Jay Bakker to teach me about race and loving all people

      OpinionMaina Mwaura

    • When a teenager gets kicked to the curb by Christian parents

      OpinionDan McGee and Linda Francis Cross

    • Unzipped: How (not) to commute

      OpinionEric Minton

    • When it comes to leading corporate prayer, are we really all in this together?

      OpinionMark Wingfield

    • Is America racist at heart?

      OpinionEugene G. Akins III

    • Note to self: Get rid of resting jerkface

      OpinionErich Bridges

    • Don’t keep sweet: Why white Christians need to celebrate Juneteenth

      OpinionErica Whitaker

    • Letter to the Editor: The importance of establishing best practices for pastoral searches

      OpinionLetters to the Editor

    • Hymn Stories: ‘Will You Come and Follow Me’

      OpinionBeverly A. Howard

    • A Bubba-Doo’s regular loses a loved one

      OpinionCharles Qualls

    • The oxymoron of being both anti-abortion and pro-gun

      OpinionEarl Chappell

    • My trip to the seamy world of horseracing

      OpinionBrett Younger

    • In the news this weekend: This is what it means to take God’s name in vain

      OpinionErin Albin Hill

    • Sympathy does not defeat white supremacy

      OpinionWendell Griffen

    • What Kenobi has taught me about God

      OpinionRob Lee

    • Is ‘fascism’ the right name for the Trumpist hard right in America?

      OpinionDavid Gushee, Senior Columnist

    • God in three persons, blessed Trinity

      OpinionBarry Howard

    • Bill Self in 1984: ‘Babylonian Captivity of the Convention’

      OpinionBill Self

    • Pope orders online release of WWII-era Pius XII Jewish files

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Demolishing schools after a mass shooting reflects humans’ deep-rooted desire for purification rituals

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Has American conservatism abandoned the Christian right?

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • In Colorado, a GOP rarity: An abortion rights candidate

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • A church was ordered to rescind its gay deacon. Now it weighs its next step.

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Can the Church Still Enact Justice When a Pastor Sues His Accusers?

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Republican Lauren Boebert jokes about AR-15s and Jesus — and yes, she’s a ‘real’ Christian

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • This World Refugee Day, rising white nationalism meets the largest refugee population in history — which is no coincidence

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • How evangelical Christians are sizing up the 2024 GOP race for president

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Abortion bill, confederate holiday removal signed by Edwards

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Buddhist leader in Bhutan fully ordains 144 women, resuming ancient tradition

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Banning Nancy Pelosi from Communion May Have Backfired

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • How Franklin Graham pushed a domestic abuse victim to return to her husband

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Poor People’s Campaign holds major DC rally to combat poverty

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • An Elite Christian College Has Become The Latest Battleground In America’s Culture Wars

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Wiccan celebration of summer solstice is a reminder that change, as expressed in nature, is inevitable

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Camino pilgrims help rural Spain’s emptying villages survive

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • What Antisemitism Looks Like When It Is Carved into Church

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Humanist chaplains guide nonreligious students on quest for meaning

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • On Juneteenth, Jewish communities are reckoning with their own attitudes on race

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • UK sanctions Russian Orthodox head; decries forced adoption

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • California again seeks to pass human composting bill as Catholic bishops oppose it

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Boise police can’t charge pastor who said LGBTQ people are ‘worthy of death’

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Ukrainian archbishop pushes against papal statements, says causes of war ‘lie within Russia itself’

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Bishop punishes school over Black Lives Matter, Pride flags

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    Conversations that Matter.

    © 2022 Baptist News Global. All rights reserved.

    Want to share a story? We hope you will! Read our republishing, terms of use and privacy policies here.

    • Facebook
    • Twitter
    • Instagram
    • LinkedIn
    • RSS